Wales's first minister yesterday demanded a radical overhaul of the Welsh Rugby Union, warning those in charge that they were "drinking in the last-chance saloon".

Rhodri Morgan, in a rare intervention in sport matters, said that the national game must be run by professionals unless it was to "wither on the vine".

The WRU is making financial losses, the Millennium Stadium is burdened with debt and there is a risk of the game's benefactors walking away, Mr Morgan said. "Those problems can only be solved if there is a complete restructure," he concluded.

Mr Morgan, a passionate rugby fan, said proposals by the WRU president Sir Tasker Watkins to appoint a profes sional body to run the game instead of the current amateur general committee had to be accepted. Sir Tasker's report will be put before an extraordinary general meeting of the WRU on May 26.

Mr Morgan said: "The national game is in crisis. It is in tatters at the top. I am asking people to stand up and be counted or see the game wither on the vine.

"It does mean the perks going - the blazers, the status and the sense of participation. But it is very serious if people are not willing to act for the good of the game and for the good of the country."

Mr Morgan said the WRU needed a professional chief executive, commercial officer and a finance officer but insisted his comments were not a personal attack on WRU personnel.

"We are treated by English rugby people as a sad case. The national team cannot even give England a game. It should not be that way. The shop window of Welsh rugby is becoming shop-soiled."

Proposals to cut the number of Premier Division clubs to six were recently defeated. Mr Morgan said it was not for him to say how many premier clubs there should be.

The WRU chairman Glanmor Griffiths said: "I would very much welcome the opportunity to sit down and examine what the National Assembly is prepared to do to help the rugby cause in Wales. Despite numerous attempts to encourage the first minster and the Culture and Sports Minister to help us to remedy the financial short falls in the public sector funding received by the Millennium Stadium, we have not made any headway."

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